Against
Corporate
Domination
and
American
Indifference
We
cry
to
you
for
justice,
O
Lord,
for
our
soul
is
weary
with
the
iniquity
of
greed.
Behold
our
Wall
Street
magnates,
our
Gordon
Gekkos
who
bestride
the
commercial
world
as
if
it
were
their
own.
It
is
they
who
defy
you
and
drain
their
fellow
Americans
for
gain;
it
is
they
who
grind
down
the
strength
of
workers
by
merciless
toil
and
outsource
or
downsize
them
whenever
the
markets
permit
such
actions.
We
cry
out
against
them
and
against
the
slumlords
and
developers
who
manipulate
and
exploit
the
poor
and
make
dear
the
space
and
air
that
you
have
made
free;
who
paralyze
the
hand
of
justice
by
corruption
and
blind
the
eyes
of
the
people
with
lies
about
welfare
queens
and
illegal
immigrants;
who
nullify
by
craft
the
merciful
rent-control
and
minority
contractor
laws
that
we
by
the
better
angels
of
our
nature
have
passed
in
order
to
protect
the
weak;
who,
sometimes
in
collusion
with
the
church
have
gentrified
the
city
against
the
interests
of
the
poor
38
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FOR
THE
NEW
SOCIAL
AWAKENING
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and
have
brought
upon
your
church
the
contempt
of
the
world,
all
for
progress,
profit,
and
ease.
For
the
oppression
of
the
poor
by
unrighteous
and
greedy
televangelists
who
have
cloaked
their
extortion
with
the
gospel
of
your
Christ
and
name-it-and-claim-it
theologies,
we
cry
out
for
relief
and
for
mercy.
We
know,
O
Lord,
that
you
love
the
weak
and
poor
and
hate
the
grasping
and
that
your
doom
is
upon
those
who
grow
rich
on
the
poverty
of
the
people.
Yet
we
too
are
afraid,
O
Lord,
because
we
too
seek
to
be
like
Donald
Trump
rather
than
like
Jesus.
The
thundercloud
of
your
wrath
is
even
now
booming
over
our
heads
and
in
our
ears,
for
we
share
the
greed
and
lust
of
corporate
domination
of
the
poor.
In
the
ruins
of
dead
empires
we
have
read
how
you
have
trodden
the
winepress
of
your
anger
when
the
measure
of
their
sin
was
full.
We
know
clearly
how
much
we
are
like
them,
so
we
know
that
the
press
of
your
wrath
is
for
us
a
cup
running
over.
We
live
as
an
unjust
empire
on
borrowed
time,
relying
on
your
undeserved
mercy
and
patience
as
we
pursue
life,
liberty,
and
happiness
instead
of
your
reign
and
the
year
of
Jubilee.
Lord,
we
believe.
Help
our
unbelief!
Lord,
we
are
sorry,
and
we
repent;
but
we
have
put
away
our
sackcloth
and
ashes
in
favor
of
Gucci
and
bling.
Save
us
from
ourselves,
from
our
commitment
to
mammon,
from
the
indifference
we
the
middle-class
have
towards
the
wretched
of
the
earth.
Save
us
from
our
leaders,
whom
we
have
chosen,
who
have
committed
us
to
be
the
worlds'
police
and
to
chase
terrorists
with
unlimited
violence
while
lusting
for
foreign
oil.
Help
us
to
repent
of
our
ways,
to
cease
and
desist
from
our
sins.
Help
us
to
turn
back
to
your
law
lest
the
mark
of
the
beast,
already
etched
on
the
right
hand
of
our
nation,
already
drenched
in
the
blood
of
other
nations,
becomes
a
permanent
mark
of
our
rebellion
against
you.
Help
us
to
wash
that
hand
by
exorcizing
our
demonic
public
policy
and
evil
foreign
policy,
lest
our
feet
be
set
on
the
downward
PRAYERS
OF
PROTEST
AND
SOLIDARITY
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path
of
darkness
from
which
there
is
no
return
forever.
Lord,
we
believe.
Help
our
unbelief!
Finally,
Lord,
in
our
new-and-improved,
internet-driven
global
village,
help
us
to
turn
to
you
with
all
our
hearts
and
all
our
souls
and
all
our
minds,
loving
the
widow
and
orphan
and
sojourner
in
our
land,
not
as
a
pastime
or
hobby,
or
a
charity,
but
as
a
royal
priesthood,
a
holy
nation,
a
light
upon
a
hill-a
hill
that
has
overturned
the
tables
of
the
money
changers
of
Wall
Street
in
favor
of
a
genuine
solidarity
with
your
blessed
poor.
We
ask,
O
Lord,
that
they
and
the
meek
inherit
your
earth.
Hear
our
prayers,
O
Lord!
Amen.
DARRYL
TRIMIEW
is
the
chair
of
the
Department
of
Philosophy
and
Religion
at
Medgar
Evers
College
of
the
City
University
of
New
York.
Previously,
he
was
dean
of
the
black
church
studies
program
at
Crozer/Colgate
Rochester
Divinity
School.
Dr.
Trimiew
is
the
author
of
God
Bless
the
Child
That's
Got
Its
Own:
The
Economic
Rights
Debate
(1997)
and
Voices
of
the
Silenced:
The
Responsible
Self
in
a
Marginalized
Community
(1993).
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